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Henry proud of 'tremendous' defensive effort

By Richard Clarke

While the "Arsenal 2" part of Tuesday night's
scoreline received the most acclaim, the "Juventus 0" bit
was just as important.

In the prelude to the Champions League Quarter-Final opener at
Highbury Arsène Wenger argued: "The first game of the two
ties determines qualification. That psychological print in the
heads of the two teams is always decisive."

Having stolen a mental march on the Serie A leaders, his captain
was more circumspect but
Thierry Henry still had the highest praise for the re-modelled
Arsenal defence that completed a record-equalling seventh
clean-sheet in the Champions League.

"I will tell you how important this result is when we have
gone over there," said the captain.

"After the Real Madrid away game everybody said that we
should have scored more. But at the beginning of the game if
everyone had said we'd win 1-0 at Madrid then I think a lot of
people would have signed for that.

"The main thing that I was pleased about [on Tuesday night]
was how we defended and the fact that we did not concede a goal.
Even on a day when perhaps they are not play that well, Juve can
always hit people.

"The defence is doing tremendously well at the
moment," Henry went on. "But there is no secret.

"For example a guy like Mathieu Flamini. He is playing out
of position and maybe in the first two or three games it was not
easy for him. He has had to adapt. That is not easy but game by
game he is doing his job. But it is harder if Jose Reyes does not
come back to help, like it is if Alex Hleb does not protect
Eboue.

"If, when we lose the ball, everybody comes back then they
have an easier job in defence. That is some stuff that we forgot
sometimes this season."

Copyright 2015 The Arsenal Football Club plc. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the sourceRichard Clarke29 Mar 2006

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